probably wrong page (sorry). Just looking for anyone who has any advice on how to cope here. Long post - NC with family. My parents were/are extremely narcissistic - I was raised to hero worship them, told constantly how lucky I was to have such hardworking parents who were so much better then all my friends parents (my mum was overjoyed when any of my friends parents had affairs or did anything worthy of complaint as it bolstered her perceived saintliness) I was always told how very close we were and nodded my head in agreement even though throughout my childhood I always knew there was something missing. Something as a child I couldn’t put my finger on, I just knew we weren’t close. Any time I expressed a negative emotion such as being upset or scared or tried to complain about something, I was shamed and made to feel guilty about it. With regards to wider family, I always felt disliked by them. Uncles and aunts would openly eyeroll at my attempts at conversation, or rush past me to get to my younger sister to lavish praise on her - how beautiful she was, how cute she was etc, while nerdy me just hung around awkwardly very aware I wasn’t anyone’s favourite. Had a hard time as a teenager, lots of bullying and bad relationships (still in one!) but unable to ever convey any of this to my parents as they just seemed to make me feel worse about it. I remember starting to tell them and regretting it so soon after making up a complete fabrication of how I had stood up to so and so and they were now leaving me alone. Totally untrue. My parents were forever ransacking my bedroom looking for nonexistent contraband and when they couldn’t find anything, resorted to reading any diaries I tried to keep or letters friends or boys had sent me, then “confronting” me with them. There was never anything of any real note in any of my diary entries or the letters. This continued until I was well into my 20s and finally moved out. They even used to read my emails - when I went travelling at 23, I was in almost daily contact with them, always made sure to let them know when I was on the move and when I arrived anywhere etc, so no reason whatsoever to worry and as a last resort check if I had been using my email account, on my return home they proudly told me how they hadn’t been worried when I was away as they had been reading my emails each day. Private emails to friends. I was so embarrassed. When I tried to complain they told me I was starting arguments the second I got home. My mum had this annoying habit of telling anyone and everyone my business, even though she never really knew what was going on in my life. She would put words into my mouth often, things like “do your friends think we’re cool???” and when I felt obliged to nod, she would then repeat that to anyone who would listen “biscuittinraider’s friends all tell her how cool we are!”
I spent my adult life making decisions based around what they told me I should be doing. I went into an industry looking back bored to me to tears because they told me that’s what I would be good at. I didn’t date certain men who I liked because I thought my parents would sneer at them for not being up to scratch, yet continued awful relationships where I was routinely abused because I didn’t have the experience of having boundaries to say no.
i bent over backwards to please my parents, to get their approval. Buying them expensive presents (which never really got much of an acknowledgment), constantly visiting even when it was inconvenient to do so. This went on and on. Any minor event in their lives, I would counsel and listen sympathetically, yet when I had a miscarriage they literally said “oh no really” and proceeded to tell me what a hard day at work my sister had reported, they never so much as text me to see if I was ok or needed any follow up treatment etc.
when I had my first child 6yrs ago, something changed. From the beginning of my pregnancy, my parents made it all about them. They were genuinely thought it was their God given right to be at the birth and when I said I would probably just call them once I’d been stitched up etc all hell broke loose and they didn’t speak to me for much of the pregnancy. At every stage of the pregnancy they behaved outrageously. When we announced we were having a girl, my dad told OH he understood he must be disappointed. When I was having the 20 week scan, my dad told me to “get rid of it” if there were any abnormalities. When my daughter was a baby, any rare occasion they looked after her for a short period they would ignore any instructions I gave them - some minor things, some big things where they were dangerously careless yet if I dared to query any of this, they would tell me I was unreasonable and shake their heads/shout at me.
It just went on and on. Any time I confronted my parents on anything, they would both gang up on me, shouting that I was mentally unwell or that I was looking for an argument.
It got to the point I didn’t like spending time with them.
when I was pregnant with my second child, who is now 3, we had an argument and we never really spoke again. When I gave birth to him, I told them, there were a few texts here and there, but we went into lockdown a few weeks later. They came round to inform me my gran had died during lockdown and looked through the window at the kids and because my at the time toddler daughter put her hands over her face rather than run to the window blowing kisses and begging for rescue as they presumably wanted, they took that as a sign of rejection and “couldn’t bear to go through it again” so they stopped speaking to me. My sister and I, although never particularly close, have never had a cross word, yet she also stopped speaking to me (I know my parents would have been talking dramatically about the pain I’ve caused them and she would have been horrified and sided with them as she is close with them). When she got married during lockdown she only invited me and one of my children and not OH and my other child, despite extended family who we were never close to growing up being invited. They don’t even text a happy birthday message on my children’s birthdays, yet to others say how hard they’ve tried to save the relationship and how devastated they are. I found out recently my sister had a baby; nobody even told me she was pregnant or of her child’s existence, I only know because one of my friends saw it on Facebook and told me (I don’t have Facebook etc).
so that’s my family. I dont miss them but often feel guilty thinking maybe I should have carried on putting up with their crap so my children have someone other than me in their lives.
Have been with OH for years and years. He isn’t a kind man, he has put me through some ridiculous things over the years, he is emotionally and at times physically abusive to me and has been for years but I have nowhere to go and no support and he is the only other family my children have. (He is never abusive to them at all, but he is a bit rubbish in that he spends most of his time on his phone rather than playing with them etc).
I feel so incredibly alone, and sad for what I wish me and my children had.
I often think about swallowing poison or jumping off a motorway bridge, who would actually care. There would’ve be minimal pain for anyone else in me escaping mine. Obviously I know I can’t desert my children so I keep on, but I worry on a daily basis how long until they realise there’s something wrong with me and can’t wait to get away from me too. My toddler son is hard work, tantrums all the time, on a waiting list to be assessed for autism. My daughter is lovely, couldn’t be prouder of what a lovely girl she is, but i feel so detached from her because she’s either at school or when at home my hands are totally full with my son and his hooliganism. I find myself shouting all the time and feel totally overwhelmed. I want a close relationship with my kids, the one I never had with my own mum, but I have no idea what that’s meant to feel like so constantly doubt there is any connection even though I love them very much I often feel detached and doubting how they feel. My daughter has good relationships with some of her friends mums (who are lovely & I’m also friends with) and pathetic as it is, I find myself feeling sad that she wishes they were her mum instead of me. Because they’re calmer, they’re happy, they have support to be good mums.
I don’t know what I want from this post, I just needed to vent somewhere as nobody knows the extent of my misery. Nobody knows how bad OH actually is, they know he’s difficult but they don’t know how aggressive he can be or the things he says to me every day, and I haven’t told anyone about how my family have disowned me because it’s embarrassing that even my own family can’t stand me.